Thoughts on school and career and life and and and
For the past however many years I've had this journal, posts that had subject lines like that typically were along the lines of "I have no plans, no goals, I'm so fucking directionless". It feels good to finally have something that I'm (relatively) good at. I don't excel in my architectural courses, I haven't been top of the class, my models or papers or whatever have rarely been called out as exemplary. But I've gotten steady As and Bs, and I feel that at this rate, presuming I can get accepted to some school somewhere (my GPA is low from my previous like 4 attempts at majors), and can continue to keep up the grades, that I can find a job and become at the very least an average architect. And I've got no problem with that. Seriously, how many current architects can you think of? Like 2, maybe? And they're the "starchitects", which is a stupid name but it's what they're called, the celebrity architects. Everybody else just fits in, does what they're told. They may do something cool, they may do a billion kitchens. I'm okay with that.
I'm tired of having a job, I want a career. I think that even as an average architect, I can live what I consider to be comfortably. I think most people consider living comfortably to be a little bit under posh. I think of it as not having to wonder if I'll have enough money to pay my bills this month. If I can eat out tonight, or if I should buy more ramen. If I can afford to see a movie this week. If I can buy more than just Triscuits to snack on. I think I'll be able to live in a place like I do now, if not slightly nicer, and possibly even start to save a bit of money, while living comfortably, and even having a few fancy-ish things. I look forward to that. I don't need posh. I'd definitely take it, I'd love to have it. But I don't need it, it's not my goal.
My mom, who is a financial planner, has helped me over the last couple of years to start saving for a house. She's taken a small amount of money from just a couple of paychecks, and turned it into what is now just under $40,000. Of course if I were to just try to withdraw that right now, I'd get taxed a ridiculous amount and probably walk away with like half of that, but she knows all the tricks and rules on how to use that money specifically towards buying a house, so that when the time comes, she'll transfer it and funnel it and trade it and do things I can't comprehend, and portions of it won't be taxed, and portions of it will be taxed far less. She tried to explain it to me once but I got confused and I just told her that I didn't care as long as it wasn't illegal and as long as she didn't skim. But that's now, and I won't be buying a house for several years, so even after whatever taxes are paid, that's a pretty large head start on a house, and I'm incredibly lucky to have her for that.
The next thing I need to seriously start thinking about is where I want to live. I've thought about it a lot over the years, but never very seriously. Now I need to start figuring out which schools to apply for, look into neighborhoods, transportation, etc. I'm seriously considering applying to schools in Toronto. New York, Chicago, San Diego. Florida too, of course, and I'll likely stay in Florida, but I can't count on getting in to any one school or state so I'm going to look all over. It's scary, but it's cool that I'm actually, finally, getting to do it.
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This was brought on by me finishing up my midterm for my Digital Architecture class. It's not as good as I'd hoped it'd be, but the more I look at it the more I do like it. And since I literally just picked up the program all of 6 weeks ago, and I put off doing this midterm until really 3 days ago, I gotta say that I guess I can say that I'm alright with how it came out. It could be better, but I could have spent more time with the program and with the model, so given the time I've put into both, I'm okay with it.
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Also, people need to stop getting engaged. That's seriously like 10 people that I know this year that have gotten engaged. Congratulations for you, that's fantastic and I'm truly happy for you .. but fucking quit making me feel lonely and unwanted already, jesus!
I'm tired of having a job, I want a career. I think that even as an average architect, I can live what I consider to be comfortably. I think most people consider living comfortably to be a little bit under posh. I think of it as not having to wonder if I'll have enough money to pay my bills this month. If I can eat out tonight, or if I should buy more ramen. If I can afford to see a movie this week. If I can buy more than just Triscuits to snack on. I think I'll be able to live in a place like I do now, if not slightly nicer, and possibly even start to save a bit of money, while living comfortably, and even having a few fancy-ish things. I look forward to that. I don't need posh. I'd definitely take it, I'd love to have it. But I don't need it, it's not my goal.
My mom, who is a financial planner, has helped me over the last couple of years to start saving for a house. She's taken a small amount of money from just a couple of paychecks, and turned it into what is now just under $40,000. Of course if I were to just try to withdraw that right now, I'd get taxed a ridiculous amount and probably walk away with like half of that, but she knows all the tricks and rules on how to use that money specifically towards buying a house, so that when the time comes, she'll transfer it and funnel it and trade it and do things I can't comprehend, and portions of it won't be taxed, and portions of it will be taxed far less. She tried to explain it to me once but I got confused and I just told her that I didn't care as long as it wasn't illegal and as long as she didn't skim. But that's now, and I won't be buying a house for several years, so even after whatever taxes are paid, that's a pretty large head start on a house, and I'm incredibly lucky to have her for that.
The next thing I need to seriously start thinking about is where I want to live. I've thought about it a lot over the years, but never very seriously. Now I need to start figuring out which schools to apply for, look into neighborhoods, transportation, etc. I'm seriously considering applying to schools in Toronto. New York, Chicago, San Diego. Florida too, of course, and I'll likely stay in Florida, but I can't count on getting in to any one school or state so I'm going to look all over. It's scary, but it's cool that I'm actually, finally, getting to do it.
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This was brought on by me finishing up my midterm for my Digital Architecture class. It's not as good as I'd hoped it'd be, but the more I look at it the more I do like it. And since I literally just picked up the program all of 6 weeks ago, and I put off doing this midterm until really 3 days ago, I gotta say that I guess I can say that I'm alright with how it came out. It could be better, but I could have spent more time with the program and with the model, so given the time I've put into both, I'm okay with it.
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Also, people need to stop getting engaged. That's seriously like 10 people that I know this year that have gotten engaged. Congratulations for you, that's fantastic and I'm truly happy for you .. but fucking quit making me feel lonely and unwanted already, jesus!